Cabbie Paul is fare going the distance

A Cumbernauld cabbie has his set his sights on running in every capital city in the European Union.

Taxi driver Paul Audain has run 10K races across a host of capital cities including Edinburgh, London, Dublin, Berlin, Amsterdam and Helsinki to raise money for good causes.

Later this year, he will run in Stockholm and Paris as part of his personal challenge to run every capital in the EU in the next few years.

At the moment, big-hearted Paul will be running to raise awareness and funds for anti-sectarian charity, Nil By Mouth.

This year, he has raised £600 for the charity’s ‘Champions for Change’ schools programme which brings pupils from different religious and cultural traditions together.

Over the past 12 months, Nil By Mouth has been very active in the Cumbernauld area with a series of workshops, assemblies and events at local schools including Our Lady’s and Greenfaulds High.

Nil by Mouth was set up by Glasgow teenager Cara Henderson in response to the sectarian murder of her school friend Mark Scott in 1995.

Paul said: “Running is an addiction for me and I’ve been pounding the streets for a few years. I was asked by a hire one night if I supported any charities to give my addiction a moral purpose, and that’s where it started.

“I began with Help for Heroes because they give more to the people who need help. Then I happened to meet Cara’s mother as a hire, we got talking, she told me about Nil by Mouth and the next thing I know I’m discussing plans for my challenge to run Europe.

“I wanted to involve as many people as I could to take part in the challenge and so far my friend Isaac McCleary, his wife Sandra, my partner Päivi Claesson and my daughters Emma and Carrie have been my biggest supporters.

“I want to encourage as many people to get up and move around so that we could improve the health of as many Scots as possible.”